BANGALORE: Despite the ongoing backlash against outsourcing, Indian call centres are all set to add another 100,000 seats this year, much higher than the 70,000 seats that the country added in 2004.

This was one of the major findings by a recent research report prepared by human resources firm Kelly Services after a survey done in four countries - India, China, Korea and Philippines.

This growth represents around 64% which is the highest across the region, the report said.

On the cost front too, Indian centres are ranked the most compebreastive among the four countries with salaries paid to agents in India being even cheaper than Philippines.

Considering the dollar-converted rates, the report stated that Indians are paid $ 0.30 per transaction, the lowest in the region covered, whereas Koreans get paid the most at $1.26.

In terms of manpower issues, the report stated that India experiences a high level of agent turnover and compebreastive poaching and that the pool of agents is large enough to accommodate this movement.

Only 11% of call centres are facing recruitment issues, while larger centres find it more difficult to recruit.

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On training patterns, the report said that agents in India have the highest number of training sessions (24 days), while agents in China only receive 11 days' training, where the segments that offer maximum training are banking, finance & insurance and business services.